Cougar 550M Optical Gaming Mouse Review

Inside the 550M

Starting the teardown process, we now have the 550M in its two halves. There is a cable attached from the top, as there is a PCB with a few switches for button functionality.

Removing that PCB, we find W's inside of oval logos pasted on this trio of blue switches. All three of these are audible when used, and require quite a bit of force to activate, so there will be no accidental clicks.

Under the DPI button, we can see how the trigger is set up. The white section is made to slide to the back of the mouse and is spring loaded as well. So for this to work you fight the spring as well as the blue switch, making it near impossible to press without intention.

Under the left click button, we find it backed with a D2FC-F-7n Omron switch rated for five million clicks. Below that we see that the support tube for the USB cable is slid into clips and also sandwiched between PCBs, so it is very unlikely ever to come loose.

We could not find the typical sensor IC in the back of the 550M, so we took this photo to show how it is set up. Also, note that there are two large LEDs used at the back to illuminate that strip along the heel.

We did, however, manage to remove the actual sensor from the mouse. While the N1449T and the 805 mean very little, the S3988 at the bottom indicates the sensor used is indeed the Pixart SDNS 3988 optical sensor.

Here we have the same 32-bit ARM Cortex-0 MCU we found in the Corsair Strafe. Here it serves the same purpose to communicate with the PC, offers the LED and main controls via software, and is also where the onboard memory is located.

The right click button is also backed with the same Omron switch, but the scroll wheel click functionality has used another switch. Here we see a blue pad style switch with a rounded top, and is firm to press and offers an audible report of its use.

All back assembled and powered up for these photos, we can see the default orange color of the heel stripe LEDs. If you look off to the left, you can also see two of the DPI indicator lights lit as well.

From either side of the desk, you will walk up to a mouse that glows across the entire back side of it. Keep in mind, this can be set to any color you see fit to mix and match with products you may already have on your desk.

This last image shows off two points. We have raised the DPI level and now have three bars illuminated denoting our maximum DPI setting is operating. The second thing we noticed is that those bars are broken up into mini bars stacked up each strip for just a bit more flair to what is already a very slick looking product on its own.